


Before Breakfast

by sarcasticsra



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-27
Updated: 2017-01-27
Packaged: 2018-09-20 08:23:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 470
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9482657
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sarcasticsra/pseuds/sarcasticsra
Summary: Kerrek has seen many impossible things in his days.





	

**Author's Note:**

> That. Freaking. Episode. 
> 
> Spoilers for ep 83, in case that's not clear.
> 
> This kind of just jumped out of my brain.

Imagine you’re a dragon.

Imagine you’re a dangerous, brilliant, scheming, _powerful_ dragon. You’ve mastered magic at the highest levels, destroyed countless tiny, petty, _insignificant_ little ants with barely an effort, and most of all, you’ve _survived_. You’ve survived wars and plagues and a good for nothing little god’s pathetic last ditch attempt to punish you, to weaken you, but even then that only made you more clever, more resourceful. You endured, you plotted, you _won_ , and now you’re but inches from a solution to your problem, a solution that will make you unstoppable.

And then your mind, your vast, glorious intellect, is _torn_ from your consciousness with a shudder and a last gasping breath; everything is back to base evolution, primal fury and instinct, and that’s when you are _ended_ , by the littlest speck of nothing out of an entire group of nobodies. And… that’s it. It’s over.

Just like that. It’s over. 

Kerrek has seen many impossible things in his days. He has seen people die dramatically in battle, he knows the way of magic, of divinity, has encountered monsters and death and what lies beyond. He has lived and he has lost, and he thought he had, if not seen everything, at least seen enough to get the general idea.

It’s not that he killed her. He barely takes credit for that, considering it only, if anything, a testament to his timing, managing to land the blow that brought her the rest of the way down. It’s not even that Keyleth was the one to take her mind, the thing she prided herself on above all else. It’s these people, these broken, busted up, beautiful people, these people with artifacts from the gods themselves, with the power to sense their allies across a mile of ocean, these people who are at once exactly like every other adventurer he knows, and nothing at all like anyone he has ever met. 

Because imagine you’re a dragon. Imagine you’re brilliant, and you’re powerful, and frankly you're probably the favorite in this fight. You’re up against a large group of powerful enemies, but they are sometimes inept, disorganized, and prone to emotional mistakes. You, on the other hand, could never be so foolhardy. You outclass them. You think eighteen, twenty moves ahead.

How do you fail? You can’t. It’s impossible.

Kerrek looks at the tattered remains of Vox Machina, more busted up and broken than ever before, missing a brother in arms; he looks at Kima and Allura, alive and safe and content with each other; he looks at the now-useless handle that once was attached to his war-hammer, vaporized with the power of his own finishing blow, and… he chuckles, quiet and sharp, and shakes his head.

Yes. It’s impossible.

Fortunately Vox Machina has never met an impossibility they didn’t like.


End file.
